


Speechless

by hopeless_romantic_spoonie



Series: Tom Hiddleston Drabbles and Ficlets [8]
Category: Actor RPF, British Actor RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, No Dialogue, POV Second Person, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:53:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22249735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hopeless_romantic_spoonie/pseuds/hopeless_romantic_spoonie
Summary: An unsettled argument between you and Tom Hiddleston leaves doubt in its wake.
Relationships: Tom Hiddleston/Reader, Tom Hiddleston/You
Series: Tom Hiddleston Drabbles and Ficlets [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1517372
Kudos: 36





	Speechless

**Author's Note:**

> This could be utter garbage, but it wouldn't leave me alone. Thank you for reading!
> 
> Warnings: What some may consider inadvertent self-harm happens in the second paragraph.

It was difficult to sustain blood-boiling rage.

You scrubbed the dishes until you your knuckles cracked in the hot soapy water, a bit of the rage simmering beneath your skin eeking out to render your efforts wasted.

Tom’s face, drawn into a frown and layered with such exasperation that you hardly recognized him, lingered at the back of your mind as you folded laundry on the expanse of your neatly made bed. Each brush of his clothing against your arms lifted just the barest hint of his soap and aftershave into the air, easing the strain on your strangled heart even with the shouted remnants of your argument ringing in your ears. An argument left unfinished, his endless stream of commitments calling his name with the incessant buzz of his phone in his pocket, leaving you alone to stare at his blurred retreating form as he left the flat in a huff that ripped your breath from your chest.

Never to fully return.

The haste at which you swept the floor couldn’t sustain your heart thundering its aggravation in your chest. With each stroke of the broom across the immaculate floor, anger waned, replaced by a stiff numbness that left you rooted to the floor, worrying your bottom lip to distract from the anxious flutter in your stomach. Harsh words spoken without thought couldn’t be swallowed back around the lump in your throat.

You didn’t expect him back. Not for days. Days of your emotions rising and falling in neverending waves only serving to rend more tears from your bloodshot eyes and sobs from your twisted mouth. So when the front door opened and closed quietly, signaling his arrival, the muscles along your shoulders bunched and tensed to drag you down. Your hand stilled over the cup of tea, long gone cold, stirred relentlessly as your eyes traced new furrows over the aimless pattern of the marble countertops.

A soft, fortifying intake of breath followed the slow thud of his shoes across the floor. The scrabble of nails on hardwood before Bobby was let into the garden. Echoing silence that stretched for an eternity until his hands stroked down your shoulders to linger on your upper arms. The heat of him against your knotted back. Masculine, strong, _home_ , matching the clean scent of his cologne that rested next to your skin from his stolen jumper hanging loosely on your frame.

The nudge of his nose against the shell of your ear had your eyes drifting closed in unwilling surrender. Your hands flexed at your sides with the familiar - and often answered - urge to reach up and tangle in the auburn curls that teased at the nape of his neck.

You turned. His hands stroked down his lean torso to hang loosely in between you, palms up. A thousand apologies shimmered in the stormy grey-blue of his eyes and none on his lips. They would be hollow, meaningless, falling on ears that had grown weary of neverending defenses softened by his velvety voice. Purple tinged his rosy skin deep beneath his gaze that searched your unyielding face for any semblance of hope.

The cotton of his shirt was warm beneath your fingertips, soft from lying against his heaving stomach. You hid from the tears that pooled in his eyes, watching instead your hands make the voyage up the planes of his chest to caress the stubble on his clenched jaw. Neither of you could resist, you in caressing the hollow of his cheek with your thumb, him in leaning into your gentle touch with a sigh that shook you to your fragile core.

It _hurt_. The yawning ache inside your chest swallowed even the sunshine of your love. It dug icy fingers into the strings of your heart and plucked at them, breaking the brittle pieces and fraying the rest. Picking at the pieces of your love and discarding the weaknesses brought on by doubt and fear and millions of voices and pasts that haunted the shadows of your home.

Salt stung your trembling fingers. The whisper of his breath across your face brought attention to the depths of your misery betraying you to trail down your cheeks, to wet your chapped lips and gather beneath your quivering chin.

Vulnerability had never found a more breathtaking model than in Tom. That gorgeous man, watching you with so much careful trepidation that the need to smooth out the crinkles around his eyes was a tangible tingle, was too much.

The sanctuary of his arms was complete, soothing and sure and tender, holding you so that your hearts beat in a stuttering drum against the other. Fighting for strength. Sounding battle cries against your uncertainty. 

If you could just hold on, just a bit longer, then perhaps the intensity of his embrace could smother the turmoil simmering beneath your skin.

Lips anchored to your shoulder. Fingertips digging into your sides. Words weren’t necessary; he wasn’t letting you go.


End file.
